For Scootch

I wrote this about 2 or 3 years ago - guess I didn't publish it. While I didn't write one when his sister died, this was extremely cathartic and felt I should post it.

Big basso rumbles and paws in my face,                                                                         Chasing your sister all over the place,                                                                                 A gentle head nudge and a grab at my hand,                                                                       Keeping you was not what we had planned.
Smiles to our lives you brought every day,                                                                          With love and affection we watched while you played.                                                         For the hearts you helped heal and the company you kept,                                                 I write a bad poem now that I've wept.
Not so good, but it's hard to condense over 14 years of one of the best and most intuitive pets I've ever had.  (Especially trying to do it in 10 minutes...)
Scootch, my wonderful gray long-haired tabby cat, was with us through a lot of different things.  Bandit, our first beagle, found him and Molly in our woodpile. The dog rarely made a noise yet on that cool day, he was out barking like crazy at the same spot.  When I finally decided to see what was going on that evening, I found two very young gray kittens.  One I could hear mewing and the other, when I reached down, hissed and batted at my hand.
There was a hard freeze coming that night and we couldn't in good conscience let them stay outside. (We figured a momma cat was moving them when the dogs showed up.) We brought them in for the night and then took them to the vet where we discovered they both had a serious case of ringworm and had to be quarantined for a month.  (Hubby was hoping to take them to Nuke-Con which was 2 weeks later to find them new homes. Like that worked...HA!) They were about 3 weeks old and I bottle-fed them, took them to my in-laws when I worked so I could easily feed them over lunch, taught them how to get into the litterbox - I hand-raised these cats.
He accepted all of the kids with good graces and much tolerance. (One time I recall Scootch was playing with MM when he {MM} was maybe 3 or 4. Scootch got tired of playing and MM didn't know it.  Scootch whacked him so hard on the cheek, I could hear it reverberate throughout the room. I was stunned, waiting for MM to cry. Instead, he looked at me, looked at the cat and laughed.)
The dogs in our lives he dealt with a little more severely. Routinely he would beat them, though they hardly realized it.  When we brought home Cletus (our coonhound), the only place he wouldn't go was MM's room, so the cats would take refuge there. One day Cletus chased them down the hall and started to come into the room. Scootch, who had had quite enough, turned around in the doorway and, for the first time, smacked him upside the head. Cletus was so startled he pulled his head back and crashed his face straight into the door jamb. He must have thought Scootch was some sort of ferocious beast because from then on, he never bothered the cats again.
He and Molly stayed with me the night before my mom died, when I sat alone in the darkness with my thoughts and feeling that she was going to die. Neither one pawed, meowed or head-butted - they just were there for a friend in a time of need.
When TSS and EB came to live with us, they'd only had a yappy, nippy dog who they incessantly teased.  We showed them how to care for and respect animals. TSS has healed a lot from the events of his previous life and had claimed Scootch as his. (After me, of course!) He started calling him "Scootch-a-Boo" and could easily spend an hour lying on the floor petting the cat.
I could go on and on about him and how positively he's affected our lives. I'll miss his deep purrs in my ears before bed and pawing at my face for me to talk to him or pet him. Hubby misses him coming up and grabbing at our hands because it's obvious that hand isn't doing anything, so it should be petting him.
Goodbye, my big gray cat.

I'm baa-aaack...

...on task (or off, considering what I'm supposed to be doing...).

Updating the blog, trying to post a little more frequently - though we've heard that before!

School
We've been revamping school schedules - again.  We had a series of months where we took off apart from life skills, standing classes and videos. The boys had become almost rebellious in doing their work, so we just stopped. I wanted to see what would happen. About a month or so ago, two came to me and asked if they could start schooling again - FINALLY! We revised a bit, and then ended up completely on a different schedule.

I now have planners for each boy and am trying to get their schedules and work into their planner. I'd done that in my own planner but that just didn't work out. There was so much to put in, plus I'd have to rewrite it all out for them anyway, that I started slacking. Now I'm planning out their week one at a time for the rest of the "official" school year, which ends in mid-June. Trying to balance schoolwork with housework and yardwork, plus field trips, scouts and other classes and activities...yikes!

EB keeps asking about going to public school - mostly after he's been hanging out with his scout buddies. I sat down with him and explained why, exactly, we'd pulled them out (he was only finishing up 3rd grade when we did that) and what cost it would have to him (no family vacations). I just don't think he's a public school kind of person. While he's extremely social, that's been a detriment in the past. He doesn't like other people telling him what to do (you know, like teachers...). I also told him he needs to put forth some effort here - he's never given it a chance as he doesn't do the work he's assigned without a fight. (Which is currently working in my favor - he can't test for his next tae kwon do rank until he gets it together...)

Me, I don't want to be beholden to the school's schedule. I already pick up other children a few days a week and it plays havoc with our scheduling sometimes. He thinks it's just going to be a time to sit and chit-chat with his friends. 

Other
I've been out of commission for a while - I have a pinched nerve in my back from a herniated disk last spring. It got so bad that I could hardly walk for an extended time. About 6 weeks ago I finally went to a chiropractor and have been extremely grateful for her services! I went back to TKD this past week and was able to do almost everything without penalty. So nice to be able to move with little or no pain and difficulty!
With that, I'm going to sign off - I have core strengthening and stretches to do before we start on the day.